Why you should go second-hand shopping on your next holiday

Souvenir hunting at vintage stores and flea markets can be a sustainable and meaningful way to feel more connected to the places you visit.

- Karen Tee

Souvenir shops all around the world overflow with mass-produced magnets, postcards, or other random trinkets. Like many travellers, I have always found the urge to pick up keepsakes while on vacation irresistible. But over time, as I watched those trinkets pile up into a gaudy, dust-collecting heap at home, I realised something had to change. They felt disconnected from the places I had visited, and worse, failed to spark memories of my adventures.

So how could a shopaholic traveller like me satisfy the urge to shop, but in a more meaningful way?